Ewing known as a leader, public servant

State school board vice president, former councilman dies Monday at 75

Blair G. Ewing is being remembered in the county and throughout the state as a staunch advocate for children and a tireless leader.

Ewing, the state school board's vice president, as well as a former school board member and Montgomery County Council member, died of cancer Monday. He was 75.

Ewing had spent the past 10 days in the Montgomery Hospice acute care center.

The Silver Spring resident had served on the state school board since 2007. Prior to that, he was a Montgomery County school board member from 1976 to 1998, including two stints as president. He also served on the County Council from 1998 to 2002.

Ewing lost re-election to the council in 2002, when then-county executive Douglas M. Duncan formed a slate of pro-development candidates under the "End Gridlock" slate. Ewing often clashed with Duncan on development issues.

The slate won all four at-large seats on the council, leaving Ewing a close fifth.

On Tuesday, Gov. Martin O'Malley (D), who appointed Ewing to the state board, called him a courageous man, whose spirit pervaded even as he fought his illness.

"I found him to be a very gentle person, but he was not at all shy to tell you very directly when he disagreed with you," O'Malley said. "The world will miss that quality he brought to public discourse."

Stephen N. Abrams, who served on the county school board with Ewing, remembered him as a "budget hawk" who really cared for students.

"It's a loss to the county," Abrams said. "Blair was someone extraordinarily dedicated to the kids in Montgomery County and always had been a champion for the schools."

Often the contrarian, Ewing was on the losing end of some key state school board votes over the years.

In 2007, he sought to postpone for a year the requirement that seniors pass four HSA tests to graduate.

We're not ready because the supports are not in place at the local level," Ewing said at the time. But his effort failed in an 8-4 vote.

More recently, Ewing voted in favor of the county getting a waiver for its maintenance-of-effort requirement for fiscal 2010, which begins Wednesday.

Under maintenance of effort laws, the county must fund its school system at the same level it did the previous year. But the state board denied the waiver request.

On Tuesday, Del. Ana Sol Gutierrez (D-Dist. 18) of Chevy Chase called Ewing larger than life.

"He was a giant in education," said Gutierrez, who served on the board with Ewing from 1990 to 1998. "He was my friend and my mentor and the reason why I ever ran for public office.

Sen. Nancy J. King (D-Dist. 39) of Montgomery Village, who also served on the school board with Ewing, called him a "crusader for children."

Ewing was a leader in the county's effort to integrate schools and make sure a quality education was offered to every student, said County Councilman Marc B. Elrich (D-At large) of Takoma Park, a former county math teacher who had known Ewing since the early 1980s.

Born in Kansas City, Mo., Ewing received a bachelor's degree from the University of Missouri in 1954, where he was Phi Beta Kappa.

He served in the U.S. Army in Germany from 1954 to 1956 and attended the University of Chicago from 1956 to 1957 as a Woodrow Wilson Fellow.

Ewing also held a Rotary Foundation Fellowship at the University of Bonn, Germany, from 1957 to 1958 and returned to the University of Chicago to complete his master's degree and to do doctorate work.

Ewing was a federal employee for 28 years, 22 of them as a senior executive at the U.S. Justice Department, Office of Personnel Management, Office of Management and Budget, and Department of Defense. He retired in 1998.

Ewing taught political science at the State University of New York at Binghamton, worked as a management consultant and was a reporter for United Press.

Beginning in 2003, he taught part-time at Montgomery College.

In 1994, Ewing married Martha K. Brockway. He leaves his widow; his son Blair Ewing Jr., and his wife Mary, his son Chatham Ewing and his wife Anastasia Lakhtikova and two grandsons,

Burial will be at Rock Creek Cemetery following a service at 1:30 p.m. Monday at the St. Paul's Church, Rock Creek Parish, Rock Creek Church Road and Webster Street, N.W., in Washington, D.C. Visitation will be 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. and 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. Sunday. at Collins Funeral Home, 500 University Blvd. W., Silver Spring.